Back home

After 9 months, 11 countries, and thousands of miles on trains, planes, buses, boats, elephants, pick up trucks, horses, paragliders, and on foot, we are finally back home. And to be completely honest it's a lovely feeling!

We had the most amazing time on our travels, and enjoyed, if not every minute of it, at least the great majority of the time we were away. The highs of incredible natural beauty, the friendliness of strangers, and the excitement of the unknown by far outweighed the lows of the odd stomach bug or travel weariness.

In retrospect, I think we did most things right with our travels. Not because of any particular knowledge or expertise but mainly just by luck and intuition. The timing of our trip coincided nicely with the greater scheme of moving to England. The time spent travelling was long enough to completely take our minds off all that we wanted not to think about, but not too long for us to get bored of travelling itself.

We were also incredibly lucky not to have anything stolen from us. We did lose a few things here and there, just because we forgot to pick them up when we moved on, but nothing essential was left behind... I think.

We have tried to list our top 5 countries, towns, natural wonders, restaurants, toilets, modes of transportation, etc. but when you see so many places, especially when they are so different from each other, it gets tricky. I will, however, attempt the impossible, the mother of all listings, the top 5 of the entire trip. Here Goes:

1. Nature in New Zealand and Australia

Franz Josef glacier, NZ


Banks Peninsula, NZ


Mount Cook, NZ


Uluru, Aus


Whitsundays, Aus


Twelve Apostles, Great Ocean Rd., Aus


2. Food in China

Stick-meat in Beijing


Street kitchen in Shangri La


Dried tofu and noodle soup in Beijing


3. The emptiness of Siberia and Mongolia

Horseriding in Mongolia


Trans-Siberian railway, Russia


Olkhon Island, Russia


Again, Olkhon Island, Russia


4. All the wonderful people we met

Jakki, Piotr, Jegor, and others in St. Petersburg


Andy & Rob in Terelj, Mongolia


Hilde & Janne in Yangshuo, China

Neil & Julie in Tiger Leaping Gorge, China


Ingo & Andy in Vang Vieng, Laos


Christmas in Vientiane with Andy, Laura, & Zoe


With Emma and Phil in Cape Tribulation, Australia


5. Unpredictability of South East Asia

Another interesting form of transport in Laos


Andy loading a moped on the bus to Vientiane


Foot massage by fish in Kuala Lumpur


Sleeper bus designed for dwarves in Vietnam



I might change my mind about this list tomorrow, and if you asked Julie she might have a completely different top 5 altogether. I guess that is the beaty of travelling.

But now it's time to stop living in the memories of our travels and start to look in the future; meet all the friends we have missed, eat some Marmite on toast, and start planning our next trip!

Kuala Lumpur and Pulau Pangkor

Kuala Lumpur was really nice, and not just because of the fancy hotel and the showers! We spent a lot of time shopping in the many markets; the idea was to get some souvenirs but we ended up with plenty of new stuff for ourselves too. For some reason I couldn't drag Mikko from the shops and into a bar, which has NEVER happened before!

We also went to Merdeka Square (parliament buildings) and up the KL tower for some nice city views, and in the evenings we had some really nice meals. There's all kinds of food here, a bit Chinese and a bit Indian and a bit Western (which we don't usually bother with except for breakfasts!), and it's all really good!



From KL we travelled up to Pulau Pangkor in search of our island paradise, and this time we got lucky! It's a quiet place with just a few restaurants to choose from, no real bars (being a muslim country) but it has a lovely beach, some resident monkeys and a really nice laid back garden in the hotel where you can just chill out for hours reading a book, playing games, drinking a beer and meeting people.





We seem to have got ourselves into a bit of a routine, which goes a bit like this:

Get up (no earlier than 10am!)
Walk down the street and grab some breakfast/lunch
Spend a few hours on the beach until we start to burn or get thirsty
Go back home for a shower
Drink a couple of beers in the garden while playing chess
Go for a walk and get something to eat
A few beers back at the hotel garden while playing cards
Bed

It's a great routine! Only on one day did we deviate from this when we rented a moped and drove to the other side of the island because we needed to get to the bank. That involved some very scary winding roads but we also took in the sights of the islands which is not much, just a few beach views and a chinese temple which for some weird reason has disney characters in front of it!




We have booked our two final nights back in our posh hotel in Kuala Lumpur but until then, unless we get bored, we will be staying here observing the agenda above :-)

Back in Asia

As much as we enjoyed New Zealand and Australia, after almost four months in the region we were ready to return to Asia. And we were not disappointed; the food is great, prices are low, and you can still find the most fantastically kitsch glittery trinkets at the markets.



Our first stop after Australia was Singapore, a good stepping stone into Asia, where it's hard to say whether the culture is more eastern or western. A couple of days there was enough as it's not that big a place. We ate well (a curry hot enough to make your eyelids sweat in Little India, and a table full of Chinese goodness in Chinatown), tried not to melt in the hot and humid air, and wandered around more or less aimlessly.



The next step was to catch a bus to Malaysia. We had decided to go to the east coast and visit Tioman Island in the hope of finding a beach paradise where to chill for a few days. We spent the first night in Mersing, a small coastal town, because we arrived too late in the night to get a ferry to the island. Unfortunately there was some kind of carnival in town and most hotels were fully booked. We finally found a room in a hotel that on closer inspection didn't have a shower at all. And I mean no shower anywhere in the hotel, not in the room, not in the corridor, not even in the garden. Oh well, its only for one night, we thought.



In the morning we went to the jetty and were reminded again that we're back in Asian time as the ferry turned out to depart over two hours after it was supposed to. Not that it mattered too much, we had gone without a wash for a couple of days, so a bit more sweating in the sun while we waited for the boat wasn't going to make much difference.



The island turned out to be really nice and relaxing, with basic "bungalows" (garden sheds) lined along the shoreline. There wasn't much of a beach or proper showers or much to do on the island though. So, we had a good day and night there but decided against a longer stay. In the morning we gathered our worldly possessions and headed back to mainland. This time we were given so many different "definite" times for the ferry departure that we knew to expect a long wait. Sure enough, the ferry arrived almost precisely at a time that didn't match any of those given to us.



After the brief island visit we headed to Kuala Lumpur. After not having a proper wash in a few days now we decided to treat ourselves to a nice hotel. A warm, powerful shower and an air conditioned room feel like heaven after roughing it for a few days in the tropics. We even have a view of the KL Tower and the Petronas Twin Towers from our window (you have to push your face right on the glass to see them, but still). The best thing is that we are only paying a bit more for this luxury than did for a sad, showerless excuse of a hotel in Mersing. So, it's a couple of days of luxury for us now, and then we'll be heading to the west coast and to Pulau Pengkor in search of beach life before we return to Europe.